I had considered re-editing it, as it has been 3 years since I wrote it. But, here is the interview I did of Gared from Planes, with almost no Q&A cut out of the original transcription. This was published in Modern Fix issue #44, but Like I said, this is a lot bigger than what got published.
Planes Mistaken For Stars by Sebastian Ulloaphotos by Amber Teafatiller
As the saying goes "If it sells in Peoria, it'll sell anywhere." Peoria was supposed to be the perfect cross section, the perfect example of "Average America." Though they formed in Peoria in 1997, Planes Mistaken for Stars perhaps didn't make the best fit as average Americans. They've since relocated to Denver, Colorado, and have never stopped relentlessly touring the country. On and off the stage, they have been determined to give one hundred percent of their being to their music. They are a living, breathing, fucking, and fighting music machine. Planes Mistaken for Stars remain to be one of the most brutally honest, hardworking, and resolute bands out there. This year they wrote new material, and got a chance to road test it on the Plea for Peace tour. Immediately afterward they went right back out on the road to promote their new full length "Up in Them Guts" on their own. For singer Gared O'Donnell, becoming a father has not squelched any of the fire that fuels the band with such intensity. On the contrary, it has only served to fan the flames. Call it emo, screamo, post-hardcore... call it screamy-naked-beardcore. Whatever you call it, it's raw, real, and heartfelt emotion that is anything but average.
Some unknowing listeners may be put off when you stick your hand down your pants and say something like "this is another song about fucking." There's a lot of material in your music that if not explicitly, could be inferred as being sexual in nature. Like some of the titles, "Up in them guts," "Fuck with Fire," and "A Six Inch Valley"... Are the sexual references meant to be taken literally?
(Chuckles) I've got a couple of answers for you. First of all, all of our imagery and titles...Yeah it definitely does have that connotation, and does sit in that context. The reason I feel that we picked that title for the record in general is because it's a double edged sword. If you can get past the sexual gratuity... if the people that know what it is and have heard that slang, once they can get past that, they can look at it to mean other things too. The whole record to me, the songs and lyrical content, really strikes a nerve in me. Some of the stuff I wrote, I wasn't necessarily comfortable writing and definitely not so comfortable singing. That's why I felt it should stick, because I'm challenging myself and we're challenging ourselves. Rock and roll is inherently a sexual beast, and I think that's missing a lot these days. A lot of people might look at us and say "what do they mean? It's a bunch of hairy ugly guys playing punk rock." To me, I think there are a lot of subtle overtones and undertones of sexuality in all of our music. Some of the times when I say "this song is about fucking," it is in a roundabout way. It's not necessarily about the act of, but a lot of it is about the emotional impact of our sexuality. It's a lot easier to say that on stage than it is to pull out a diagram and explain word for word what I mean. To me it is very sexual. The six inch valley thing... (Chuckles) I was wondering when somebody would pick up on that, but it's not a sexual reference at all. It's actually from a Bruce Springsteen song. {Laughter) I was wondering when somebody else would get as dirty as me, ha-ha. You won a blue ribbon brother.
It seems as though lately you've tended to play with bands that don't necessarily have the same sound or garner the same crowd. Is that purposeful?
It's not always purposeful. Then again, it is definitely something we try and nurture. It's nice to go out with all sorts of people all across the spectrum, that way we don't get pigeon-holed ourselves. It kind of just happened that way. A lot of our friends' bands don't sound anything like each other. But, it's kind of a happy accident. It's something that's definitely refreshing, because we get to play to different kids on each tour that we go out on. Obviously, the Ataris pull a different crowd than Hot Water Music. It's cool. It never really feels like we're preaching to the converted.
A lot of the kids have been asking for autographs. Does it make you uncomfortable?
It's one of those things where when I was a little bit younger I was probably a little bit cockier about it, like "Fuck that, autographs are dumb." However, the more I've done this, the more I realize... especially like on the Ataris tour for example. A lot of these kids are like fifteen or sixteen years old, and it might be the first show they've ever been to. The fact of the matter is that you are standing on a stage and you're higher than the crowd and you look bigger than life. Some of these kids are like "Wow I actually met this person." So instead of acting like we're above that, I'll do them. I'll sign something for some kid. Kind of just seems like a document to me. Well, here's what I do actually; I have a son. Every band that we tour with, I try to get vinyl from them and have all the bands sign it for him as a document. So, some day when he's fifteen or sixteen years old, I'm going to have a giant box of records for him, all with little personal messages to him. It's really kind of a grey area. I definitely don't think that kids should look at anyone in a band as being better or bigger than they are. However, at the same time it's kind of neat. That way they will be able to show, "Yeah, I was there." I mean, fuck, there are plenty of bands that I would... If I could have met Phil Lynott from Thin Lizzy I definitely would have liked to have gotten his autograph. It just brings it down to an even more personal level. It's kind of like "wow, I actually like shook this guy's hand"
How was working with AJ Mogis at Presto!?
AJ! He's a special guy man, I love him to death. He's a good fella'. He's a hard guy to get to know, but once you know him there's a huge payoff there. In retrospect, after we recorded the record with him, it's all fallen together. How it worked, certain things he did, certain ways he was, and exactly how they benefited the recording... I wouldn't have had it come together any other way, now that I can look back on it a little bit.
What influenced your decision to work with AJ?
There are a couple of different reasons. I guess the most obvious one would be that we're really close with Cursive. They put out the best record of the year last year. "The Ugly Organ" is just an amazing record. When we went in there we were under no illusion that we would sound like that record because that's totally two different bands. But, there's definitely a quality to the recording that is very appealing to us. It's very earthy, very natural and warm. That's what we wanted to go for. That's one reason, the other is that AJ and those guys are really easy to work with. They're not expensive yet. They're actually rather reasonable. They're also in a part of the country that we're familiar with. Lincoln is only seven hours from here. The other studios that we were looking at would have been 15-20 hour drives for us. It felt good to be just far enough removed from home, that we weren't at home. It's really hard to get stuff done when you are at home. It also felt good to know that we were only seven hours away.
Why did you feel the need to re-record the song "Bastards" on the new album?
I feel like "Spearheading the Sin Movement" is what it is. I'm very proud of it. I think we're all very proud of it as a piece. However, I feel like Ep's and 7"s in general don't reach the same amount of people for whatever reason. I don't understand it myself because some of my favorite pieces of music are 7"s. As far as the sales ratio goes, compared to a full length, there's a pretty big jump there. Say somebody sells 5,000 full length records, they'll probably only sell 1000 7"s. I think the point of it is that lyrically that song, I thought it needed to reach a larger audience. It's one of the few songs where I can actually pinpoint myself on what it means word for word. There is a message there, and I felt like it's one that we needed to share with people. I also wanted to get a better recording of it.
When you decided to leave Illinois, why did you choose Denver, and how long have you been there now?
We've been here a little over five years now. There were a lot of reasons. I had some family connections out here. That made it a little bit easier seeing as how my mom and brother lived out here. Also, in large part it was due to [the fact that] it wasn't typical. It wasn't a typical place for a band to get up and move to. Everybody moves to New York and LA. There's enough bands out there, there's enough stuff going on, I felt like we'd get lost in the shuffle. So, we came here. For touring, it's centrally located, really. We're in the middle of the country. It makes it a little bit easier to get to each coast.
It's still a pretty young music scene out in Denver isn't it?
Yeah, there's never been any one predominant thing going on here. And that's kind of cool, because you don't have anything to live up to or anything to be shunned for. I can just imagine how well we would have gone over in La. People would have hated us because we don't give a shit about fashion, and we don't give a shit about scenes. So, we just kind of came here, and we have friends here. Over the years we've made a lot of really close friends. Even here, we're just kind of doing our stuff. It seems like we're on tour more than we are at home.
So you're not really at home sort of setting the bar for Denver?
No, we definitely claim Denver. We're from Denver by way of Peoria. I think that all the bands here that are involved with each other push each other a little bit more. I'd like to think that people see us busting our asses and that it inspires them to do the same. I see bands from here that are really pushing the envelope in some areas and it inspires us to do the same.
How was your experience with the Plea for Peace tour?
The plea for peace tour was amazing. It was like a giant field trip because we're so close with Cursive. The crowds were kind of hit or miss. I think that on any tour that's a little bit bigger like that a lot of kids have it made up in their minds what they are there to see and that everything else is crap. I could tell that there were a lot of kids there that totally didn't get us, and just thought we were garbage. Whatever, they were there to see Cursive. I think it was a lot of Cursive's fans were the ones that were all "Ooh icky, Planes Mistaken for Stars sucks." I think they'd be surprised to know exactly what kind of people Cursive are, what they are into, and the approach that they are coming from. It was a beautiful tour. Mike Park is an amazing fellow. He's a beautiful guy for setting that up. Saul Williams is a stellar soul. And Cursive, obviously, they are blood. I couldn't have had a better time. It would have been nice if some of the crowds would have been a little bit more receptive to us. There were some shows that were a breath of fresh air where I felt like "wow, these kids are really here to see us and they're getting into it." It doesn't even have to be like that to be an enjoyable show. I think kids should at least give things a shot. You can look out in a crowd and tell which kids are there that have already made up their minds before you hit a one note that they're going to hate you. That's just how it works. Kids would probably be surprised to know what teddy bears we really are.
I tried to go see you guys in San Diego while you were on that tour. How was the crowd? I heard they were kind of shitty.
Yeah it was really pretty terrible. I think everybody was on par. Everyone performed really well. We tried to have fun. I mean, we had fun with each other on stage. The kids were just kind of like "impress me." I could have pulled a rabbit out of my fuckin' ass and none of those kids would have smiled. It was pretty ridiculous. San Diego, depending on where you play, seems like it has a lot of weird baggage going on. Some people have actually written us and said "Oh, don't play at this place." The problem was that it wasn't our tour. I can just suggest as much, but when shows have been set up for months and months it's really hard to pull out. It's one of those things too... It's kind of an uphill battle getting a show in San Diego anyhow. We've played the Che [Cafe] several times. Sometimes it's really been good to us, and other times it's been like "Oh wow, there's four kids here." The last two times we played there it was really good. It also seems really insular, like there are only certain kids that go there. It seems that there's a scene around the Che. I look at as "the more the merrier." It's a bummer man. I like the city. I have friends there, and it's a beautiful town. It just sucks that I never know what's going on. I mean, we could headline there tomorrow, and I really couldn't tell you whether there'd be 200 kids there, or 20, or 10. It seems like a lot of the kids might be fickle, but I don't know.
You've had two bassist changes. What brought the lineup changes about?
Well, the first bassist, Aaron [Wise], was in the band for the shortest amount of time. Like I said, we were such a young band. We just kind of started going right out the door, really struggling and fighting for what we wanted to get done. We all wanted to tour, tour, tour. He was one of these guys that wanted to tour one month out of the year. He was not much, but a little bit younger. We were 22 he was 19. There is a little bit of a gap there. He was still in school, and he felt like he had to do school. He did, he really needed to. That's what he got done, but we couldn't all wait for him. Then, I don't know what happened with Jamie [Drier]. He was in the band for five years. He was one fourth of the band. We kind of came into our own with him in the band. I think we really became a pretty well oiled fighting unit with him. One day he just up and decided he wasn't into being in a band anymore. It wasn't that he wasn't into being into us, he just said he never wanted to be in a band and that's all there was to it. A lot of people ask me, but I don't know. I'm going to start sending them his phone number, haha. He's one of my best friends in the entire world. I still talk to him fairly regularly. I guess he's just doing his own thing. He works for a record store, plays his acoustic guitar, and draws a lot. I don't think we've ever been on bad terms with either of them. When there is a separation or a shakeup like that there is definitely a need for a mourning period and to give each other space. It still breaks my heart that Jamie quit, but at the same time I wouldn't trade what's happened because of it for a million dollars. It's really exciting what's happening now. Chuck [French] has added a new energy, a new slant on things. He's made us pay attention to things that we maybe didn't pay attention to before. He's teaching us a lot and he's learning a lot. It feels really good.
How long has he been in the band?
Um, it feels like forever... I don't know, a year now. Out of the record we wrote there was only one full song that we had done before he joined. We had lots of bits and pieces and scraps that we re-evaluated after Jamie left. We threw some stuff out, and beefed some stuff up with him.
Your first record was initially self-released. How'd you end up with Deep Elm re-releasing it?
Initially Deep Elm contacted us on our first tour. I called home and my grandma told me there was a message there for me. I remember when we recorded that I only sent one copy out, and it was to Deep Elm. We had played with one of their bands. I think it was Pave the Rocket. They were like "Hey, you should send this to our label, they do comps and stuff. I think he'll dig it." When I sent it to him [John Szuch] I was under no illusion that this guy was going to sign us or something. It was totally like an afterthought. I guess as soon as he got it he called and wanted to do this and that. Our whole thing was like, "whoa, we've only been a band like six months." We're not really into signing contract, number one. Number two, if we were going to, it seemed like a bad time to do it. We didn't even have our own footing yet. We weren't even sure what the hell was going on. So, we told him "let's keep in touch." Months later, what we came up with was we were going to keep on pressing it here in the states and try to find distribution. We told him that he could press it overseas, because in a million years we wouldn't have known how to get good distribution in Europe. We told him that he could do the vinyl, and that we'd do all this if he did it on vinyl. We couldn't even fathom how we could ever have afforded to get any of our recordings onto vinyl. That's the biggest deal to us. That was and still is... like "Oh wow we have our own record." It feels like a real piece of music once it's committed to vinyl. He ended up just pressing it here and selling it here. We didn't really complain because in hindsight we really didn't have the resources to take it on. So we were asking around, talking to other labels, and really trying to start our own label for "Knife in the Marathon." Once again it ended up that we were touring so much that we just couldn't get that together. So, we had him put out "Knife" for us. Actually all the way up to "Fuck with Fire," we saved the money ourselves from touring, and recorded and paid for everything, and we would just get reimbursed. So we did "Knife" with him and we decided "let's leave." It kind of nice, we sort of just passed through. I think it's sort of rotten how some bands treat independent labels as stepping stones to get somewhere bigger. I think that's rotten. I also think that the cool thing about indie labels and independent music are the people that really are true to form, and that you can work with as many people as you want. It's kind of nice, and you learn a little bit from each label you work with. They learn a little bit from you, and you reach different kids. There might be some kids that only buy deep elm records, who wouldn't buy a record on No Idea because they've never heard of it, or vice versa. I'm really stoked that things worked out the way they did to say the least, and that we didn't get tied down to like a 4 or 5 record deal. A lot of young bands might jump on the first thing that's whacked in front of them, and I'm pretty stoked that we didn't.
How'd you hook up with no idea? Why have you stayed with them?
I started getting into No Idea stuff when he [Var Thelin] was doing the zine, when I was sixteen. He's been around for like fifteen years now, doing records. When we went and recorded "Fuck with fire" we sent out two or three copies to two or three different labels. The one that I focused on was No Idea, because I really respect him. He's put out tons of records. The thing is, for as many records that he's put out, even though I might not love every one of them, there is a reason that they are put out. Those songs and those bands needed to be documented, and they mean something. He really believes in everything that he puts out. That's something that means a lot to us, because there are so many labels that will just put out what they think will sell. Our whole position was that we were all fans of the label and we have a lot of friends on the label. We were buddies with Hot Water [Music] and Small Brown Bike... It just seemed right, and it ended up being right. That's why we're still on No Idea. I suppose there are flashier labels that we could have looked into and tried to pimp ourselves to, but at the end of the day No Idea is just a perfect fit. They really care about us, and we really care about them.
How'd you get involved with the Black Flag tribute on Initial Records?
We're just friends with the initial guys. They just called up and said "hey, you want to do this?" We said that it's a no brainer man, fucking A! I probably wouldn't have picked up a guitar if it hadn't been for Black Flag.
Yeah, but aside from the 12" you guys have your own 7". Why'd you record three songs as opposed to everyone else who recorded just one?
Actually I think we recorded four or five. What happened was I think they sent every band the same amount of money to record with. We've always been about getting the most for your money. So, when we went in and did that we recorded five songs. We did four Black Flag songs and one original, just to have as a demo for us. We actually recorded that song "Earning Ire" in the same session. Plus it was fun. It took us like two days, or rather two practices, to learn four or five Black Flag songs. We just went in and smoked through them. We did them all live and recorded five songs in like probably four or five hours. Since we had so many extra songs, they were like "Well, fuck, let's use them."
Was "Fucking Fight" only released on vinyl?
Yeah it was, up until recently. Recently some label in the UK put it out on CD, which I thought was silly. It kind of happened without our knowledge, through various misunderstandings and miscommunications. We initially thought they were going to repress it on vinyl. They went ahead and put it on CD, which I think is silly because it's like 2 and a half or three minutes of music. On a CD it just seems like a waste. To me it seemed like a vinyl piece. That's what it was, it's a single. Our original plans were to eventually tag it onto a seven inch collection. On CD sometimes the spirit's not there, it just seems very cold and calculated. I was pretty excited that the 7" had been around and out for three or four years before anybody put it on CD. When we finally did put it on CD I wanted it to be with a bunch of other stuff.
You used to skateboard didn't you?
Yeah, that's what got me into punk rock. I always have a board. I usually have one on tour. I still cruise around a pop a kickflip here and there. I don't skate like I used to. I'm too scared to. If I break my arm, there goes there tour. It's still definitely in my blood though.
Aside from being a father, is Planes pretty much a full time gig for you right now?
Yeah, I don't get paid, but it's definitely full time. Other than to my family and friends, I can't imagine devoting as much of myself or of anyone of us to anything else. It's pretty all encompassing, really.
Is it a struggle just getting by from day to day when you are not on the road?
Absolutely, what little we can scrape together from touring definitely has to last us. There's not a whole lot of glory in it.
How has becoming a father changed things for you and the band?
It's definitely rather trying. But at the same time in some senses it makes what I do easier, because I want to do it even better for him. I want to live even harder for him. Being a father makes a lot of things that you once cared about seem really frivolous and unnecessary. Then, it makes things that you really always cared about become a little bit clearer. It makes you focus a little bit better on what's really important. It's humbling to say the least.
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